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Weekend Wonderland offers holiday fun in downtown Bethany

Coastal Point • Tyler Valliant: Bethany Beach kicked off its Weekend Wonderland events this past Saturday, Dec. 2, and will continue for the next two weeks.

Having kicked off the holiday season in style with its tree-lighting ceremony and Holiday Happenings event last weekend, Weekend Wonderland fun continues in Bethany Beach for the next two Saturdays.

Many Bethany Beach businesses will be open on Dec. 9 and Dec. 16, with special activities abounding to put shoppers in a festive holiday mood, according to Lauren Weaver, executive director of the Bethany-Fenwick Chamber of Commerce, which sponsors the events, along with the Town of Bethany Beach and the town’s downtown business group.

Health department: Customers should visit a doctor

Coastal Point • Tyler Valliant: A Selbyville barbershop was shut down last week for allegedly performing piercings and tattoos, possibly also operating without a barbershop license, and alleged grossly unsanitary conditions.State health officials said they really don’t know just how many people may have potentially been exposed to alleged unsanitary conditions at a Selbyville barbershop that was also allegedly illegally performing tattooing and body-piercing.

On Nov. 28, the Delaware Division of Public Health (DPH) ordered closure of the B&B Barber Shop, located at 5 West Church Street, Unit 203, in downtown Selbyville. The shop was ordered to stop performing body-art activities, which were allegedly occurring without a permit, but also to close the barbershop operation for what officials called “grossly unsanitary conditions.”

The sign at that location, located in the Church Street Station shopping center, reads “Boris Barbershop.”

“In this case, the observations included evidence of a rodent infestation, improper disposal of sharps and other conditions that could contribute to transmission of disease,” said Jamie Mack, a DPH policy lead and technical advisor.

Reader weighs in on proposed regulation

Editor’s note: The following letter was addressed as comments to Secretary Susan Bunting of the Delaware Department of Education, regarding the draft anti-discrimination Regulation 225, which was up for public comment through Dec. 4. The comments were sent to the Coastal Point for publication.

Coastal Point photos • Submitted: Scott Gordon delivers supplies to Puerto Ricans affected by Hurricane Maria. His non-profit, Kite4Water, is currently fundraising to return to Puerto Rico.Imagine having the family home flooded by a hurricane, losing transportation and power, and having to ration food. Now, imagine trying to survive all that while also having no access to clean drinking water.

“There’s a global water crisis going on — probably a billion people around the world who don’t have access to clean water,” said Bethany Beach native and Indian River High School alumna Scott Gordon, one of the co-founders of Kite4Water, a group of kite-surfers who have joined together to “collaborate with NGOs around the world to focus on sanitation and clean-water projects.”

Gordon went on a humanitarian mission to Puerto Rico from Oct. 13 to Nov. 1 after hearing of the destruction there following Hurricane Maria.

“As far as how things appeared when I first got to the island… It looks like a bomb was dropped,” he said. “Everything is devastated. A lot of people’s houses survived, but they’re missing part of their roof, or something like that. It seemed like every single house was affected in some way.

Board cites fear of litigation and possible construction costs

Coastal Point • Laura Walter: Sheila Warrington and others this week encouraged the Indian River School Board to voice its opposition to proposed state Regulation 225, which is intended to expand anti-discrimination protections for students. However, Warrington argues that the proposed amendment would remove parents’ rights to be informed.

The Indian River School District’s school board and superintendent are voicing their opposition to a proposed state regulation that was meant to protect at-risk students. They said they fear the anti-discrimination policy exposes the IRSD to heavy risk of litigation and possible construction expenses to accommodate changes.

The Office of the State Fire Marshal this week was investigating a mobile home fire in Millville on Monday, Nov. 27, that may have resulted in a death.Special to the Coastal Point • Submitted by the Millville Volunteer Fire Company: Firefighters discovered a body in a mobile home after a fire in Millville on Monday, Nov. 27.
The fire, on Club House Road near Route 26, was reported just after 1 p.m. on Monday, according to Assistant State Fire Marshal Michael G. Chionchio. When volunteers from the Millville Volunteer Fire Company arrived on the scene, the mobile home was engulfed in flames.

Upon entering the burning structure, firefighters found the body of a person who had not yet been officially identified as of the Coastal Point’s press deadline on Wednesday. The victim’s body has since been transferred to the custody of the state Division of Forensic Services for an autopsy.

Response to the blaze was challenging, MVFC representatives said, because the mobile home was set back off the roadway, with no paved access to the structure.

The Indian River School District has a vacancy on the board this week. Douglas Hudson bid farewell to the Board of Education as he prepares to move to a new home outside his representative district, District 5, in the Selbyville area..

Hudson sent the board a letter of resignation, which Board President Charles Bireley read at the Nov. 27 board meeting.

The Ocean View Town Council is considering raising some fees for next year. The council discussed the changes on Nov. 14, holding a first reading, ahead of a final vote anticipated at their Dec. 12 meeting.

South Bethany Police Chief Troy Crowson swears he isn’t trying to sell anything. But he was visibly impressed with a home-security system that recently assisted with preventing a possible crime in South Bethany.

Recently, while outside of Delaware, a woman was able to use live security footage to see strangers approaching her South Bethany house — and tell them to leave.

We have long sung the praises of Delaware Tech Community College (Del Tech) because of their initiative in starting a career-path program focused on the aviation industry, since the Delaware Coastal Airport is in such proximity, and it seemed like a common-sense approach to higher education.

Idenitfy the jobs. Train students to perform those jobs. It just makes sense.

Reader demands more from County officials

Coastal Point • File Photo: Vaughn Baker serves one up against Tripp in 2016.Research is revealing that laughter is one of the best medicines available, and you get plenty of it in pickleball.

I recently invited Matt Pencek, sports director at TV station WBOC, to Northside Park in Ocean City, Md., to meet nationally-ranked pickleball pro Sarah Ansboury so she could talk a little to him about the then-upcoming Beach Blast and give him an opportunity to learn a little about pickleball.

I taught the previous sports director at WBOC how to play tennis, so I understood a little about their business. When the WBOC camera and microphone shows up, bystanders normally preen and pose. When the sports director comes out, he is accustomed to viewing younger athletes in uniforms. The pickleballers were not preening, and they certainly were not in uniform.

When Matt was setting up the camera, he had a gaggle of pickleballers milling all around him, and some bumping into his camera. As he was refocusing his camera, he scanned the crowd one more time and then looked at me, surprised and in bewilderment.

Officials from area coastal towns met recently under the auspices of the Association of Coastal Towns (ACT), focused primarily on the issue of dredging in the inland bays, Bethany Beach Mayor Jack Gordon noted at the Bethany town council’s Nov. 17 meeting.

The Sussex County Board of Adjustment voted unanimously on Nov. 20 to deny two special-use exception applications filed by Oakwood Homes. The company was seeking special-use exceptions to permit manufactured homes on two separate lots, each measuring less than .75 acres — one located on Hoot Owl Lane near Dagsboro and the other on Julie Court near Frankford.

Coastal Point • Submitted : Members of the First State Detachment of the Marine Corps League are running around the community helping out with the Toys for Tots campaign.For anyone who has walked into a local business lately, chances are they’ve seen a Toys for Tots donation box.

“There’s a lot of need out there,” said David Kline, a member of the First State Detachment of the Marine Corps League, which organizes the annual toy drive and earlier this month placed the large collection boxes in various locations throughout the area.

“We have the toy collection boxes we put out, and we also put out cash collection boxes — you’ll see a little plastic box with our Toys for Tots logo on it. I have two Marines who have done that for quite some time,” said John Lowery, coordinator for the First State Detachment Marine Corps League.

“Several organizations have parties or events to support the program. We have local restaurants and some communities put on parties this time of year, and they either donate the proceeds or collect toys, and then we receive that from them.”